Flexible solar panels provide interconnection among multiple photovoltaic cells employing the “tab and string” technique, in which two or three conductive ribbons are soldered between the front and back surfaces of adjacent cells.
Such methods of providing interconnections among adjacent photovoltaic cells suffer from many deficiencies. For example, solder joints can fail from thermal coefficient of expansion mismatches and defects. Further, known methods oftentimes require significant labor or capital equipment to assemble photovoltaic cells. In addition, formation of closely packed photovoltaic cells is difficult for such methods.